MPLS provides benefits such as supporting multiple applications, decreasing forwarding overhead on core routers, and supporting forwarding of non-IP protocols. MPLS establishes label switched paths using label distribution protocols like LDP to propagate labels between routers so that packets can be forwarded based on a label lookup rather than a routing table lookup at every hop. During convergence after a link failure, routing protocols first reconverge while MPLS convergence involves repopulating forwarding information based on stored label mappings.